Gold is not far away from being a fiat currency itself. It may exist in finite amounts, but it still has no intrinsic value other than what we assign it.The only currency that has "real" value is bartering with actual goods, but good luck running an economy on that.There are a lot of good reasons to use a fiat currency, and it is no less legitimate than precious metals.

I can't eat gold. It won't fit into my gas tank, and I can't screw it either. What is it about gold that gives it some sort of magic power that fiat currency doesn't have? If everybody stopped caring about the metal gold beyond its ability as an excellent conductor of electricity, its value would drop pretty fast, too.Fiat currency is valuable because it's a scare resource people assign an arbitrary value to. Gold is valuable because it's a scare resource people assign a arbitrary value to.If you really want to go hardcore, get rid of gold and currency and start trading in liters of gasoline, or in goats. That makes more sense than gold.